“Have you been to a Real Football game Lately?”

By

Gerry Niskern

The quarterback on these teams doesn’t make 20 million a year and the halfback on the team didn’t receive a huge signing bonus when he joined. They are required to sign on for workout during the summer. That’s a Valley of the Sun summer of 110 degrees, not a couple of weeks in cool Flagstaff.
.Down on the turf at the high school near us the jerseys were wet with sweat every evening. The slap of pads hitting pads and grunts when spikes hit skin filled the air. One young player said “the wind sprints at the end of practice are the worst”. Then it’s hit the showers and homework time. That’s the scene at every high school in the valley. They might be thinking of the pros, but mostly, those kids just love the game.
One of my earliest memories as kid back East was sitting between my parents at the high school games with the snow piling up on our blanket. And I remember my mother screaming, “They’re piling on our boys!” Of course, after we moved to Arizona, she did that every year at Phoenix Union, too.
The big game in Phoenix was always on Thanksgiving Day between the Phoenix Union Coyotes and their rivals the Mustangs of North High. The red and black against the red and blue was the best game of the year.
Think about taking your family to one of the playoff games at your neighborhood high school. The Vikings are great. So are the Cardinals, the Panthers, Eagles, Knights, Cobras Rockets, Demons, and you name it. The list goes on.
Most games start around 7 on Friday night and are over early. The tickets are reasonable. Maybe you can show your kids the plays you used to make or their mother can teach them her old high school cheers. And as you walk along the side lines, you might feel the tension of the parents who have taxied their sons to their practices year after year, starting with Pop Warner They’ll be the ones secretly praying, “Don’t pile on our boy”.
When the band marches onto the field you’ll find yourself joining in the school song and believe me, you will see a real football game!